COMMEMORATIVE ASSEMBLY HELD IN HONOUR OF PRESIDENT TUDJMAN

ZAGREB, Dec 12 (Hina) - A commemorative assembly was held in Zagreb Sunday night in honour of the late Croatian President Franjo Tudjman, the creator of the independent and sovereign State of Croatia. Family members, representatives of the legislative, executive and judicial authorities, diplomatic and consular corps, Church and numerous scientific, cultural and other institutions honoured President Tudjman with a minute of silence at the beginning of the assembly. The commemoration began with Croatia's national anthem "Our Beautiful Homeland" (Lijepa nasa). Speaking at the assembly were president of the Croatian National Parliament and acting President of the Republic, Academician Vlatko Pavletic, Prime Minister Zlatko Matesa, president of the Croatian Academy of Arts and Sciences Ivo Padovan, president of the Croatian Homeland Foundation Ante Beljo, and Apostolic Nuncio in Croatia Monsignor Giulio Einaudi on behalf of the diplomatic and consular corps. A short film portrayed the life and historic role of President Tudjman in the creation of the Croatian state. The commemoration in memory of Franjo Tudjman, who passed away late Friday night, ended with the song "God, Watch Over Croatia" (Boze cuvaj Hrvatsku). "If we wish to recall Tudjman's creative person today, after this loss the degree of which we are still not capable of assessing, we will say symbolically, word for word: firm, authentic, bold, resolute, focused, unstoppable, steadfast, erect, victorious," Academician Vlatko Pavletic said at the beginning of the commemorative assembly. Pavletic added Tudjman had been the only "bright exception as a Croatian politician and statesman, a commander-in-chief and victor -- all in one person". As a statesman, Tudjman had anchored all negotiations with superiority and had been victorious in the most important issues and moments crucial for the survival of Croatia, while as a commander-in-chief he "flashed with the talent of a strategist, demonstrating it with the 'Storm' operation before the entire world," Pavletic said. As a historian, Tudjman believed history books were written to more quickly and directly reach the hidden sense of the present until its end, that is, until the threshold of the future. Speaking about President Tudjman's life, Pavletic stressed, "in the past decade, nobody could remain just an observer of events, because all events grasped and grabbed hold of a person with different intensity, turning him/her unavoidably into an active participant, into Tudjman's associate in gaining the independence and overall strengthening of Croatia, into a kind of a co-signatory to all his important decisions which determined our path through the thorns to the stars". Pavletic said that Tudjman had tried to convince the foreign public "of the justification of the Croatian fight for independence and of the foundation of the Croatian state on the idea of many centuries of statehood maintained despite everything and in spite of all those who oppressed, encroached and enslaved Croatia". Tudjman's goal was a free Croatian people in their own independent state, and his principle was never to give up and cease, but also not to rush headlong, Pavletic said. He knew how to choose a moment, he was capable of relying on the right power at the right moment, the power of the people who voted him authority to continue on this path at a referendum. "All his associates, not only the closest ones, as well as the entire people, realised and adopted two of his important political ideas: 1. The reconciliation of all Croatians in a free and prosperous Croatia; 2. When a bloody conflict could not be avoided, the effort to save the lives of our people, those on the battlefields, as well as those in the background. The result of such a policy is well-known: first the lightning "Storm" operation, and then the bloodless reintegration of the Croatian Danubian region," Pavletic said. "A creator and writer of history in one person - this, in short, was Franjo Tudjman," Pavletic said. He concluded that "it is our responsibility in this place, at the moment of farewell, which undoubtedly marks the end of something, and the beginning of something else, to take on the obligation not to, at any price, deviate from the joint goal which is: to be and remain democratic in everything and, in important issues, a unanimous people in a free, independent, sovereign Croatia in the fold of European peoples and states to which we belong inseparably and since times immemorial." At the beginning of his speech, Prime Minister Zlatko Matesa recalled that important historic battles for Croatia had been won under the leadership of President Tudjman. History will forever remember that it was under the leadership of President Tudjman and the party he established, the Croatian people had, for the first time after nine long centuries, established an independent and sovereign Croatian state, he added. Tudjman shaped his programme and policy -- besides on general democratic principles of modern civilisation, on three important parts and starting points of recent Croatian history "on Starcevic's Croatian historic statehood right, formed in freedom- loving ideas of the French Revolution. Then on Radic's general humane republicanism which state-building Croathood had transferred into the widest people strata. And finally, on a positive core from the traditions of the Croatian left wing which proclaimed the right of the Croatian people to self-determination, which was included in the principles of the AVNOJ (Anti-Fascist Council of the National Liberation of Yugoslavia) and the ZAVNOH Croatia (Country Anti-Fascist Council of the National Liberation of Croatia), which was inhibited by a one-party centralism and utopia of the communist society," Matesa cited Franjo Tudjman. The birth of the free Croatian state was followed by much resistance in the international community, Matesa said, citing Tudjman: "We realised that the creation of the independent, sovereign and democratic State of Croatia was not reconcilable with those powers who, in maintaining the Versailles order, and in expecting a new order in this part of Europe, had other plans, and the idea, especially the reality of the sovereign and independent Croatian state, were incompatible with these plans". This President Tudjman's assessment was not contradicted by the development of events. In fact, it was never more present than today, Matesa stressed. Matesa said President Tudjman ascribed great significance to the role the self-confidence of the Croatian people played in the final victory. To this effect, he quoted the President: "We succeeded because we elevated the self-confidence and the determination of the Croatian people. We said that we could achieve a Croatian freedom and state if we had the majority, if we were resolute, and if we would not let ourselves hesitate and be deluded. We succeeded because we were correct in our judgement that the crucial historical moment favoured the achievement of the greatest Croatian goals. We were able to draw conclusions from the experience of our predecessors, who were at the helm of the policy of the Croatian people, who - even with the best intentions - judged wrongly and made wrong decisions. In carrying out our programme and state policy we were as resolute as we were sensible. For the achievement of our goals, we knew how to adjust our concrete decisions to political and international circumstances, and (we knew) that the future of democratic Croatia depended on our not allowing, in the first place, any rifts in our ranks." Premier Matesa said that under President Tudjman's leadership, the Croatian people achieved, he quoted the President: "historic victories in political, military, and diplomatic battles, along the arduous path of the deliverance of the Croatian people from the Yugoslav and Communist yoke." Matesa quoted President Tudjman who said that Croatia established "and in the Homeland War defended the sovereign and independent, democratic and free Croatian state. We organised a state authority and its juridical system. We succeeded because at the right moment we dared to act and do what others did not, because we wanted to, knew how to, and could." The President of the Croatian Academy of Arts and Sciences, Ivo Padovan, stressed that by electing Franjo Tudjman a regular member of the Croatian Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1992, "the Academy, highly appreciating his contribution to historiography, rectified the injustice done to him in 1965, when his election as an Academy member had been thwarted because of his support of Croatian interests in historiography". Padovan added that Tudjman's works were characterised mostly by his daring in tackling research problems and the way he interpreted them. Ante Beljo reminded that in the mid-1980's, President Tudjman came among the Croats in North America and in Europe, to whom he returned on several other occasions. "Dr. Tudjman's intention was not to stay among us in emigration, but to take us into the battle for democratic Croatia and the creation of conditions for our return from emigration to an independent and free homeland. From a country with five centuries of emigration, Croatia thus for the first time in its history became a country to which Croats were returning," said Beljo. Tudjman was a man who enjoyed the unreserved support of Croatia's emigration, Beljo said, "because that emigration knew well what a misfortune it was not to have one's own state, and how important it was to create a state to the measure of the Croatian man and Croatia's national interests." On behalf of Croatian emigrants around the world, Beljo extended deep condolences to the Tudjman family, relatives, friends, followers, and supporters of Tudjman's work. Apostolic Nuncio, Monsignor Giulio Einaudi, on behalf of the diplomatic and consular corps expressed respect to the memory of President Franjo Tudjman and his dignity as the first head of state of the independent and sovereign Croatia. "We are grateful to President Tudjman for giving us the honour, as ambassadors, to hand our credentials to him personally, we enjoyed his trust and support in performing our diplomatic tasks. He always received us with generosity and good-will as representatives of friendly countries, open for cooperation and dialogue. In Croatia we enjoy a caring, kind and generous hospitality," Monsignor Einaudi said. He recalled that, at the beginning of the creation of the Croatian state, in Zagreb in the spring of 1992, there had been only three ambassadors. Today there are 70 of them, of whom 41 are in Zagreb and 29 are based in other countries. (hina) lml/ha/rml mm